R.I.P., Funkman

So ends the epic OMEA 2021 Signfest (I hope). This is an awkward strip. I guess the first two panels are designed to be redundant in case the newspaper cuts them off, but having Harry ask if Funky is nervous about the surgery (and naming the type of surgery again) right after he’s told Funky isn’t looking forward to it is just awkward. Fear of death as a punchline is also awkward but totally normal for this strip. It’s funny how whenever something bad happens to Les or Lisa it’s portrayed as high tragedy, but with Funky it’s always for a lame joke or making fun of him.
Funky giving away all of his clothes is funny to me, only because I assume his wardrobe is 99% Montoni’s t-shirts and aprons.

Clouds and Clods

It always kind of amazes when Batiuk does this kind of thing. I think he is the absolute last person who should be making fun of anyone else for being in a cloud, considering he can’t even get his own character’s names right anymore. Or when he’s just finished his third consecutive day of “two uninteresting, unattractive people stare silently at signs”.
I don’t quite get what Becky and Harry’s expressions signify here. Are they both just baffled and confused about what “the cloud” is? That’s probably it.
I wonder if the OMEA even knows they’re featured in this strip anymore. If they did, I can’t imagine they’d like being associated with it. I have to imagine the main emotions it elicits in readers are “nausea”, “annoyance” and “bafflement as to how it still exists”, which usually aren’t what you want people to think of when they think of you.

Scoreless

Haha, because everyone confuses bands and football teams, they’re basically the same thing, right? I’m assuming this is supposed to be a “pun” on alternate meanings of “scoring” (which isn’t funny even if that is the case, a word can mean two things, that’s not automatically funny), but even if Batiuk was determined to do this strip there’s a much better way to go about it.
“Scoring for smaller bands”. “Not with groupies”.
And for all that Batiuk talks about how his strip transcends the stereotypes of the art form, or whatever crap he says on his blog these days, strips like this are just an insult to the art form. Literally no art is needed. This kind of “humor” is appropriate for an AOL email chain. It doesn’t need art at all. When your sequential art gains literally nothing from having art, you’re doing it wrong.

Take a Long Rest, Tom

Aw, the lovebirds are enjoying a quiet moment together, enjoying someone else’s “pun”. (Is it a pun when you use a symbol? It seems like it could be.). As glad as I am to not have Dinkle or Becky talking, would it have killed Batiuk to have a little more of a joke here? Like maybe have one of them say “What an arresting display!” or something? At least the sign wasn’t crappily taped to the side of the table. I’m kind of amazed by that.

I Wish He’d DisAPPear

I’m going to ignore the “haha, apps are confusing mystical objects that nobody can understand” “humor” here and just focus on Becky. What in the world is her expression about? The raised eyebrows and smirk look more seductive/romantic than anything else (although in the second panel she looks eerily like Pete and Summer, because for some reason only three or four face types exist in this strip). And honestly, if it was revealed that Dinkle and Becky were actually having an affair, it would vastly improve the logic of this strip.  Because “deaf band director who retired decades ago is constantly shadowing the current band director for no real reason” is stupid. It was the same thing with Linda and Buck. I think it’s a sign of bad writing when totally unintended subtexts actually make more sense than the actual plot.